TfL opens consultation on Barclays Cycle Superhighway CS5

Campaigner will scrutinise safety features on route running from Victoria to New Cross (and not Lewisham as originally planned)

Cycle Superhighway Map inc Super Corridor

Transport for London (TfL) has opened a consultation on Barclays Cycle Superhighway CS5, which is planned to run to Victoria from New Cross, and not Lewisham as originally envisaged. The body that runs London’s major roads says that safety is a major guiding principle in the design, which will be closely analysed by cycle campaigners.

Current proposals for the route, which will cross the river at Vauxhall Bridge, heading through Peckham, Camberwell and Kennington on its way to the city centre, include ‘early start’ traffic lights for cyclists at Vauxhall Bridge Road/Millbank, an off-road short cut for riders on the Vauxhall gyratory, and the installation of 3,000 bike parking spaces along its length.

Criticism since their launch that the Barclays Cycle Superhighways gave cyclists no more protection than a lick of blue paint intensified after the death in October 2011 of Brian Dorling at Bow Roundabout.

His death, and that of several other cyclists in autumn last year, led to Mayor Boris Johnson ordering TfL to review junctions throughout the city, including those on the proposed and planned Barclays Cycle Superhighways.

It was also revealed that TfL had ignored recommendations on cycle safety at the Bow Roudabout from a report it had itself commissioned, with keeping motor traffic moving viewed as more important.

As a result, TfL’s proposals for CS5 will come under particularly close scrutiny from cycle campaigners and opposition politicians alike to gauge whether it has fully embraced the safety of cyclists in the route’s design.

For its part, TfL says that it has incorporated planned safety improvements at 52 junctions on the route, including “new advanced stop lines, cycle feeder lanes and speed reduction measures,” as well as greater use of mandatory cycle lanes (delineated by a solid white line that other vehicles are not permitted to be driven or parked in).

Following discussions with the boroughs whose territory CS5 passes through – Westminster, Lambeth, Lewisham and Southwark – TfL has today launched its public consultation, which will run until 11 January 2013.

Ben Plowden, Director of Planning, TfL Surface Transport, commented: “Barclays Cycle Superhighways are a great way for commuter cyclists to travel into central London on safe, direct, continuous routes.

“A lot of work has been put in to ensuring these lanes are created using the themes emerging from the Better Junctions cycle safety review process to ensure the best possible improvements for cyclists.”

TfL will be holding events outlining its plans for CS5 (proposed designs can be found here) at three locations along the route over the coming days:

Originally, the route was due to have started in Lewisham before being moved closer into the city centre to New Cross.

“As design progressed, it became increasingly apparent that in order to fulfil the Mayor’s commitment to ensure the Cycle Superhighway is of sufficient high quality, physical constraints along this stretch would limit our ability to complete the route to these top standards,” explains TfL.

“We are still very much committed to delivering significant cycling improvements on this part of the A20. Although they will not be formally branded as part of the superhighway, the route will still benefit from better cycling facilities, with 0.7km of new mandatory cycle lanes and substantial resurfacing of the roads.”

Born in Scotland, Simon moved to London aged seven and now lives in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds with his miniature schnauzer, Elodie. He fell in love with cycling one Saturday morning in 1994 while living in Italy when Milan-San Remo went past his front door. A daily cycle commuter in London back before riding to work started to boom, he's been news editor at road.cc since 2009. Handily for work, he speaks French and Italian. He doesn't get to ride his Colnago as often as he'd like, and freely admits he's much more adept at cooking than fettling with bikes.

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Coleman[334 posts]5 years ago

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"Mandatory cycle lanes."

Oh dear, cue shouts from white vans about cyclists being obliged to use the (usually not fit for purpose) cycling facilities.

So they gave up and made the route shorter? A real lack of commitment. Was there the possibility that the full route would have affected traffic flow?

In fairness, that bit of the New Cross Road is perma-gridlocked because of the confluence of the A20 and the A2 and adding a full width cyclelane a la Embankment is a non-starter.

I'll take the positives where I can get them although if the route goes down the Camberwell New Road then I suspect it will be just a very thin stripe of blue paint on account of there not being room for anything else.

“As design progressed, it became increasingly apparent that in order to fulfil the Mayor’s commitment to ensure the Cycle Superhighway is of sufficient high quality, physical constraints along this stretch would limit our ability to complete the route to these top standards,”

So, this basically means that the stretch from New Cross to Lewisham is of poor quality already and can't be adapted, so instead of trying to make improvements they are going to leave it in its current - unsuitable - state?

In fairness I don't think it's that bad from New Cross to Lewisham actually - road could do with resurfacing, but couldn't they all?? The excuse above sounds more like code for "we can't afford it"...